Without Options (11 page)

“Maybe he got in, dropped off his bags at a relative’s house and then went for a walk.” Andreas shrugged his shoulders. “Ran into the wrong guy.”

“I don’t think so,” Gustav said. “Do we have a missing person reported? I doubt it. No. This guy was here for a meeting. He let someone get too close and that got him killed. But he was here for a purpose. He came directly here from the Hauptbahnhof, I’m guessing. If he had a bag he probably left it at the train station. Have our people check the cameras at the station and see if they can catch this guy on video. Maybe he actually met the killer there. Or perhaps we’ll see if he put a bag in a locker there.”

“Sir, that could take a long time.”

“Not really. We know the track, the train and the time he arrived.”

“Of course. I’ll do it myself.” Andreas hurried off to a patrol car.

Standing there alone, the medical team waiting at the periphery for his signal to take away the body, Gustav stripped off his latex gloves and shoved them in his pocket. Then he took out another piece of gum and unwrapped it, his eyes on the dead man. He thought for a second about spitting out the old piece of gum, but not at this crime scene. The others had been drop sites. This looked like the kill location. Instead, he simply shoved the new gum into his mouth and added it to the old stuff. God, he wanted a cigarette.

He thought about the case. Did he finally have a break he could use? Maybe the killer wanted to throw some evidence his way. Wasn’t he too smart to leave all of this behind? Gustav motioned for the medical team to bag the man and then wandered around the scene deep in thought. A case like this could make or break a career. It didn’t matter much to Gustav. He could move on to retire. But he could help his young associate, Andreas. Something like this could come just once in a lifetime of Polizei work. His eyes scanned the buildings surrounding the park, checking to see who might be watching the scene. Nobody out of the ordinary. They needed a break. Maybe this guy had finally made a mistake.

Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Headquarters
Moscow, Russia

A woman in a black karate uniform maneuvered around the hard cushioned floor, her eyes keeping track of three potential young male attackers as her perfectly-toned body moved smoothly and gracefully counterclockwise. Suddenly a man tried to slip in from behind her. As if she had eyes in the back of her head, she thrust her left foot back, catching the man in the stomach and knocking him to the floor. Now the other two thought they found an opening and attacked simultaneously. But the woman shifted quickly to her right, swept her leg and sent one man to the mat. With a twist of her body she snapped a kick to the second man’s groin, dropping him to the ground also. She slid back, brought her fists together at her chest, and bowed her head to the three men, who dejectedly returned the woman’s bow. The three men left the exercise room for the locker room.

The woman relaxed and finally saw she had an audience of one, her assistant, Russian Army Colonel Vladimir Bortnikov. She hated when he interrupted her mid-day workout.

As deputy director of external counter-intelligence, General of the Army Tatyana Petrova was the first woman to rise so high in the SVR or its predecessor, the KGB. She had been trained at Russia’s finest universities and had started off her career in the military flying helicopters in battle in Chechnya. Along the way she had left her male counterparts behind, intellectually and militarily. She was on the fast track to become the first female SVR director. Even in her mid-forties, with her fit body, her silky blonde hair, her high cheek bones, and her elegant demeanor, she could have been confused on the street for an aging movie actor or super model. But that would have been a mistake. She was a sixth degree black belt in karate and knew how to use just about any hand-held weapon in the Russian arsenal, from knives to sniper rifles.

Wiping her face with a towel, Tatyana stepped closer to her assistant and said, “What is it, Vladimir?”

“General, you asked to be informed on any changes in Germany.”

Assessing her assistant, she noticed he seemed to have a lot more gray than when he started working for her six months ago. And he was five years her junior. Maybe she was working him too hard. Note to self. . .give Vladimir leave. In December.

“Well?” she asked.

“I think we might have a problem with Anton Zukov.”

She threw the towel to the floor. “Zukov’s only problem is he doesn’t seem to have any contemporaries who think outside the box like him.”

“But, ma’am. . .”

Tatyana waved her hand as if she would strike her colonel. “What is the problem? Get to the point so I can take a shower and eat my lunch.”

“He seems to be deviating from the plan, General.”

If she believed in a God, she’d hope he would strike this man in his tracks if he didn’t get to the point. “And?”

“He’s left one of the potential assassins dead in a park in Berlin.”

She twirled her hands for him to continue.

“And they still haven’t been able to track down that American, Jake Adams.”

“You have got to be kidding me, Vladimir. He’s one man. And he’s not even with the CIA anymore.”

The colonel clasped his hands together as if massaging arthritis from them. “Yes, ma’am,” he said.

Tatyana Petrova considered her assistant more carefully. Something was really bothering him. “What’s the matter?”

His mouth opened and closed a few times. “I don’t understand this direction,” Vladimir said reluctantly.

She squeezed down on his shoulder. Maybe she should give him leave in November. “We don’t always know everything we’d like to know, Vlad. Sometimes we must just do what we’re told. As a military officer, you know this deep in your bones. It’s programmed into your DNA.” Could she give him a little more information? Maybe it would settle him down somewhat. He was like a dog outside a Korean restaurant. Okay, she assured herself, just a little more information. “As you know, Russia has lost much power in the world in the last few decades.”

Colonel Bortnikov nodded his head as if in shame.

“Well, we’re just trying to build ourselves back up to where we were,” Tatyana said, a slight shrug of her shoulders. “You understand?”

“Of course, ma’am. But how do we do that by killing these men?”

She smiled and said, “That’s easy. We won’t be pushed around the school yard again. Their agencies will think twice about sending their operatives into the field without great caution. And this caution will lead to mistakes on their part.”

“It’s a game,” Vladimir concluded.

“It’s always a game, my friend.” She took her hand away and patted him on the shoulder as she started for the showers.

“But General.”

Tatyana stopped without turning around, taking in a deep breath. Finally, she twisted to face her assistant.

“Won’t the CIA react. . .” He hesitated as if seeking the proper word. But then he didn’t continue.

“We hope they react,” Tatyana said. “We live in a world of action and reaction, Vlad. We’ll see how and if they respond. That’s part of the equation.” She shifted her eyes toward the door and her assistant finally took that as a sign that he was excused.

She went back into the locker room and stepped out of her karate uniform. Then, as naked as the day she was born, she glanced at herself in the full-length mirror. Her only imperfection was a couple of scars she had gotten over the years—most were from being shot down in Chechnya. Lifting her perfectly-rounded breasts and letting them drop, she noticed they still didn’t sag but were not as uplifting as they had been in her youth. Damn gravity. Turning around, she slapped herself on the buttocks and smiled at how firm she still was in that area. She could live with that. Smiling, she stepped gracefully into the shower.

12

Jake woke late Sunday morning with the smell of sex in the air and his left knee aching somewhat. He rolled over in the semi-dark bedroom to find Alexandra gone, a dent still in her feather pillow. Reaching down, he found he was still naked. Okay.

He found his backpack and pulled out some fresh underwear, socks, and a shirt, before heading off to the shower. While he let the hot water pelt his body, he thought about where he’d go next. It was one thing to simply run away from his problems, but he was endangering Alexandra by staying here. He knew that much. Somehow someone would figure out their relationship and show up to kill him. And he couldn’t put her in danger like he had with Anna. Sure Anna put herself in danger with Interpol many times, but she shouldn’t have had to watch her back while she was with Jake. Even though he was officially retired from the Agency, Jake guessed he had made too many enemies in his years there.

He came out of the shower still toweling off and found Alexandra back in the room, laying fully clothed on her side of the bed.

“What’s up?” Jake asked.

“Not you.”

“You didn’t get enough last night?”

Raising her brows, she said, “I got plenty.”

Jake got dressed and the two of them went to the kitchen, the smell of thick, dark coffee wafting in the air. She poured them both a cup and they sat at the small kitchen table.

“I’ll get out of your hair today,” he said.

“Maybe I like you in my hair.” She smiled over her cup of coffee.

He couldn’t keep her in danger, but he also knew that was the nature of her business with the German Federal Intelligence Service. The BND had pulled back many assets during the years after reunification with East Germany, but had slowly built itself back up with the war on terror.

“Where do you plan on going next?” Alexandra asked.

Shrugging, he said, “I don’t know.” That was partially true, but the less she knew the better.

“Stay on the move,” she said. “But I don’t need to tell you that. Sorry.”

“It’s all right. It’s good to hear it from someone else. Someone I trust.”

They stared at each other. God she was gorgeous. He knew that if it wasn’t for her job she would’ve probably been married with children by now—assuming she even wanted them.

“What?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

“You were wondering why I didn’t have a boyfriend.”

“Are you psychic?”

She smiled at him. “Maybe. I don’t even consider having a boyfriend. A husband is out of the question. Not with my job. I would need a very strong man. Someone who understood what I did for a living.”

He nodded understanding. “I better get going.”

“I think you need a ride.”

“I’d appreciate that.”

Jake rounded up his backpack, strapped one of his guns under his left arm, and covered that with a windbreaker. He wished he’d taken his leather jacket. But there had been no room in the pack for that.

Outside, she had Jake put his pack in the back seat and they got into her BMW. She started to drive away, a look of confusion as she glanced in the rearview mirror and turned right on a small residential street.

“What’s the matter?” Jake asked, his eyes shifting to the right mirror and seeing nothing of interest down the street.

“You get to know all the cars on your street,” she said. “Especially in our business.”

“And?”

“And there was a new one.” Her eyes concentrated behind her. “There. . .rounding the corner.”

Jake glanced back and saw the dark green Audi following them. “Looks like two guys.”

She picked up speed and turned left, shoving Jake against the door. Now she gunned it, the engine powering up. Home field advantage, Jake thought. She would know every way in or out of her place and take a different route almost every day. He looked behind them again. The Audi was still there but farther back. Seconds later and she entered a priority road heading toward Munich.

“The train station is the other way,” Jake said.

“I can’t bring you there now. They found you and they found me.”

He studied her and knew she was right. She wouldn’t be safe at her own home now. They could pick her up and force her to tell them where Jake had gone, even if she didn’t know.

They were flying down the two-lane road now. A sign ahead directed them toward Autobahn 95, and Jake knew that would bring them right to the outer rings of Munich. From there they could head west toward Augsburg, east toward Salzburg, or north to Nurnberg. They got onto the Autobahn and were only there for a moment before they had to decide which way to go.

“Are they still behind us?” Jake asked.

“Yeah.”

“Persistent bastards.” He pointed to the turn ahead. “There. Take ninety-nine.”

She quickly powered down, caught the exit and onramp to Autobahn 99 and said, “Which direction?”

“West.”

At the last second, she cranked the wheel left and jammed the gas down, shoving them back into their seats. Jake ran the road system in that area through his mind. Germany was great with signs, though. As long as he knew where he wanted to go eventually, down the road a ways, the signs would lead him there. And he knew his intended destination. Autobahn 96 would bring him toward Memmingen and then to Switzerland. Farther ahead, Autobahn 8 would bring him toward Augsburg, Ulm, Stuttgart and then Karlsruhe. From there they could head south into Switzerland, north to Frankfurt or beyond, or west into France.

“Where now?” she asked calmly.

Jake checked behind them, but he couldn’t see the Audi in the increased traffic. “Take the eight toward Stuttgart.”

Moments later she did just that and then picked up speed to more than 200 kilometers per hour. Neither said a word for a long while, Jake racking his brain trying to understand how anyone could have found him at her place.

“How could anyone have found me?” he asked her.

She kept her eyes on the road. “I have no idea.”

“Really.”

Turning to him, her eyes strayed from the road too long before concentrating again on the task of driving at high speed. “Really,” she repeated. “You think I would sell you out, Jake?”

That thought hadn’t crossed his mind. “No. It’s just that.” He hesitated.

“I understood your comment on the phone before I picked you up at the train station. The Prussian man and the Spree River.”